The system obviously works, see NYK but Woodson adjust that system to the players he got. He even had some iso plays for Melo. The thing about D'Antoni I did not see any adjustment on his system, he forces that system to our group of players.

Shaq in his prime mowed down everyone. Nelson's real brand of small ball was playing 3 guards and two small forwards back in the late 80's. no other team was doing that or tried that ever since. that system has shit to do with D'Antoni's pick-n-roll spread offense. you are right about that one

the concept of D'Antoni's offense makes a lot of sense and that is why more teams are copycatting it/finding personnel to fit it. Unless you're the Adleman run Sacto kings, most NBA offense revovle around pick and roll/or isolations. it's difficult to defend if you can space the floor with perimeter players. more and more we are seeing "stretch" 4's or 5's. Ryan Anderson got a 4yr/$34 mil contract? say what?

Howard's magic teams were successful because Rashard lewis, turkoglu, nelson could hit 3's if you chose to double him. Gortat was a beast but rarely were they on the floor together. the defending champs, Miami, decided to do away with a center position altogether and put Bosh there instead.

as discussed before- it's easier to defend 2 low post guys. the lack of spacing makes it easier. if anything the lakers are the ones behind the learning curve though i wouldn't say the offense is the primary problem

at this point of his career- can your boy, Gasol, still play at a championship level at the "4"?

This is a key thing a lot of experts are missing about the Lakers. Metta is effectively their lone three point shooter. Especially with no Nash. Kobe is not going to accept the role, Nash has to run the pick and roll as the ballhandler, Dwight can't play the high post effectively because he's not a good passer or dribbler really and they certainly can't camp both bigs down low with zero floor spacing.

Duhon isn't effective enough overall on offense for his three point shooting to be a solution, and Meeks is basically not out there when Kobe is.

If Kobe was willing, they'd probably be better off letting him handle the ball in the primary half court role with Meeks as the "point guard" to have the extra shooter. Even that would never be as effective as Nash though.

Seems to me bigger problem is the defense. Lack of communication and nobody's making an effort to stay on their man. Perimeter player constantly lose their man and relies on help D. It is also the reason you don't see too many transition baskets from the Lakers.

This Lakers team constantly falls behind by 10-20 points and relies on Kobe's late game baskets to make the final scoreboard somewhat respectable, which by then is way too late. Dwight's been also horrid. On the other night, it was pathetic to watch Greg Smith constantly going for uncontested lay ups while Dwight helplessly was watching from 1 feet away. It's become quite normal to see the other teams' big man posting big numbers against the Lakers(allowing easy penetration is also the cause). Effort just doesn't seem to be there wholy as a team on defensive end, no hustle and no focus. Offense unfortunately doesn't look much better in consequence as good ball movements are scarce.

Again, the team has been battered with injuries and the bench is terrible.

The defense is no worse than the Knicks and Heat and will improve with health and time. Gasol, Nash, Blake are like first-team defense compared to Jamison, Ebanks, Morris. Duhon's a great defender but his offensive offense play a huge role in the morbid periods that lead to those deficits you mention.

funny though in tonight's game, kobe was asked for possession several times in ot. but nash took the ball inside and made the game clincher. I don't think that will sit well with kobe. lol

I wonder though, like I mentioned before. Right now it is a distant realiry but Kevin Love has still been talking smack about the management in minny. and Love does hold ties with LA. interest for Gasol by minny still seems to be there. It would look like Minny would be shooting themselves, but yhen again, don't they always? I don't hate Gasol and maybe yes he might just be a victim of the coaching system, but having a younger PF would help the Lakers transition to the future if their current "super team" falls apart.

NovU wrote:Lol. Kobe took 41 shots. I don't think this will sit well with Dwight. I think there's good chance for him to walk this offseason.

for a while when nash was still out with the leg injury, kobe was dishing out assists at a high rate. it would have been nice to have seen nash and kobe dishing out assists together at a high rate. the basketball iq of the two put together is just incredible. the lakers are running too many iso plays for kobe.

Assists by Kobe is not an issue. Howard is an alpha male and hates being a second fiddle which exactly he is with Kobe. I don't think this was what he expected when he chose the Lakers. Wasn't that a partial reason he specifically wanted BKNs Deron not Derrick Rose? The Lakers initially weren't in his list as Kobe wanted him to be a Tyson Chandler which exactly he became.

Winning has a way of smoothing things over, so if the Lakers get it together there's likely a reasonable chance he'll be more accepting of the role. Anything short of a championship though, I think there are pretty good odds on him walking.

I don't think it id an actual championship rather the need to bask in the limelight that gets dwight going.

dwight has nevet been a dominant scorer, so it is hard to see him bring the consistent #1 scorer on any team. so unles he starts showing off the moves olajuwon taught him, it is hard to imagine he will be happy on any team.

A bit strange, but a lot of ppl are doubting them & wanting them to lose. They are underdogs compared to Heat & Thunder. They're obviously big dogs when you're talking underdogs, so can't really call them underdogs . I think it's more I like to see offensive minded teams with good point guards.

Andrew wrote:I still don't know that I'd call them underdogs; they're certainly underachieving, even with the injuries they've endured thus far. In any event, it just stood out to me, but fair enough.

i would call them ill fitted. for me gasol has to go, because at this point of his career he should already naturally transition to play more minutes at center like what garnett is doing. most nights the tandem of howard and gasol is too slow. Gasol is not a bad post defender, but also he was never a great help defender. So now Dwight is left all by himself to guard the post and players that penetrated. so like what I have been saying since last season's playoff, I'd rather see hill even sacre rather than gasol start at 4 . Nash was never for me a good signing for the Lakers. The Lakers especially Kobe gambles a lot on defense, Kobe needs a back court mate that has the ability to keep up with elite guard on defense, not an elite play maker that is an absolute ghost on defense. anyway this is how I see where the lakers are getting t wrong.

gasol becomes a liability at 4 when kobe, dwight and nash is on the floor. at times it looks like he has even fallen further down the pecking order on ofense.

even with the big win by lakers over portland that had the team giddy at the post game interview, one thing was clear, aldridge was still able to get away with a 12-17 performance on shooting mostly on jumpers. gasol just can not chase down most opposing 4s these days. ok maybe it might be to much to stop starting gasol in favor of sacre for a whole season, but in situations where the Lakers are up againt a tram with an athletic pf, the time that dwight and gasol plays together might have to be limited or another way might be that on defense gasol mans the paint and dwight comes out to chase opposing bigs that have range on their shot.

slowly other things are falling into place, dwight finding his shot. kobe and nash are doing well in tbe backcourt. mwp finding some consistency in his game. morris starting to develop and a little less turnover prone, finally showing why goudelock was expendable. morris might just bscome the real mini-mamba.

I mean, their offense is great .... but their defense at times is atrocious. I don't think this type of defense will break the streak of the Clippers. They need to teach that team a lesson. LOL. Barnes really doing well in the other face of LA.

Bruce wrote: gasol just can not chase down most opposing 4s these days. ok maybe it might be to much to stop starting gasol in favor of sacre for a whole season, but in situations where the Lakers are up againt a tram with an athletic pf, the time that dwight and gasol plays together might have to be limited or another way might be that on defense gasol mans the paint and dwight comes out to chase opposing bigs that have range on their shot...

for me gasol has to go, because at this point of his career he should already naturally transition to play more minutes at center like what garnett is doing. most nights the tandem of howard and gasol is too slow.

Thaddeus is more of a SF I think, especially when Philly still had Brand and Speights. I did not get to watch the game, based on the stats, it is an undestatement to say the starting front court tandem of the Lakers did very poorly.

"Cause we're old as s---," said the 34-year-old Bryant when asked why a lack of energy has been a problem for the Lakers all season. "What do you want? We just got to figure out how to play when we don't have that energy. We got to change things up a little bit defensively. We got to figure out what we want to do offensively, figure out what we want to do on nights when we don't have those legs or have that energy."..."You just saw an old damn team," Bryant continued. "I don't know how else to put it to you. We're just slow. You saw a team over there that was just younger and just had fresher legs and just played with more energy, and we were just stuck in the mud. I think individually we all have to figure out how to get ourselves ready each and every game to have a high level of energy. That's all that is."

And... MWP's response.

Metta World Peace, 33, refused to accept the age of the Lakers' roster as an excuse for their play, pointing out what the New York Knicks have accomplished so far this season.

"That's no excuse, the Knicks are playing great, so that's no excuse," World Peace said. "You can't use it as an excuse for us. Thank you. Thanks for trying."

Having an older roster hasn't stopped the Knicks from starting the season with a 21-10 record, good enough for the second-best mark in the Eastern Conference. The Knicks started the season with an average player age of 32 years and 240 days, the oldest in NBA history, according to STATS, LLC.

But the thing is, most of the players that caused the average age in NY to go up don't get heavy usage. Thomas, Camby and Wallace are all off the bench, and I think Wallace is still out. Even their old rookie Prigioni is off the bench. Only Kidd is getting the most minutes out of the above 32 bunch. With the Lakers, Kobe, Pau, Nash, Metta are all getting heavy usage. Only Jamison is the above 32 yr old player that is not getting heavy usage.

That is the lamest excuse I've heard so far this season. First it was Brown, then Gasol, then D'antoni, and now it's age which targets all aged players and management's winning decisions on every moves. What a morale boost, eh?

The Spurs are another good example, while the Mavericks were one of the oldest teams in the league when they won it all a couple of years ago. Metta World Peace spouts his fair share of nonsense, but I'd say in this case he's got the right idea.

I still refuse to believe Gasol isn't capable of being more dominant. I vehemently believe D'Antoni doesn't know how to utilize him.

When you've got Metta World Peace in the post and Gasol on the perimeter, you know the coach is a fucking moron. I don't give two fucks of what D'Antoni did in Phoenix. He's a gimmick coach who can run P&R basketball and only that. Take away Steve Nash from him & he's a shit, shit coach. Fuck him. Fuck management for being so fearful of his sisters "control" over the franchise that he'd opt for this nincompoop over the most succesful coach in basketball history.

"We have to figure that out," Bryant said. "We need to go through him a lot, lot more. A lot, lot more. He needs more touches on the elbow, more touches on the post. He's not a scorer type of a person, he'll be the first to admit that, but he can make plays for others down there. He can control the game from down there, and we got to find a way to get him more activated."

"Bryant said he planned to speak with D'Antoni about Gasol's role at practice Saturday. "Pau is just going to continue to be patient," Bryant said. "He's obviously frustrated and has every right to be. I'm frustrated for him. But, I mean, that's something that we have to solve because we're not going to get where we have to go with him not playing at maximum potential and using his maximum potential."

"I won two championships with [Gasol]. We won two championships playing through him, really. I know what he's capable of doing."

They keep saying it & having sit downs & dinners and what not...yet I see nothing of it in game.

Even if it is from Bleacher Report, it's worth a read;

Gasol is the team's second-best passer behind Nash, and he has better fundamental skills in the post than Dwight Howard. But D'Antoni seems hellbent on ignoring those attributes while trying to emphasize the poorest aspect of Gasol's game.

Would it kill D'Antoni to draw up a few plays for Gasol at the rim? Or how about running a few pick-and-roll plays with Nash that begin with Howard on the elbow and Gasol in the paint?

Unfortunately for the Lakers, it may take a Gasol trade to prove that he is really not the problem, and then the Lakers can spend the rest of their spring trying to find D'Antoni's replacement since the playoffs don't seem like a reality while he's roaming the sidelines.

"Offensive guru" my ass, he's an offensive guru when he knows how to use his best players to the best of their ability. Then I'll call you an offensive guru. Heck even Stoudemire threw his ass under the bus saying he's never had a coach who has held him accountable for not playing D. You think Phil Jackson would be "scared" to bench Howard because of his terrible free throw shooting? D'Antoni is, oh franchise player to be, can't bench him. Be a coach bitch, it's more important to win the damn game before you worry about the future.

Their defense wasn't too bad down the stretch when they almost pulled off the comeback, though the Clippers were doing a pretty decent job of almost choking the game away with some poor offense while they tried to run down the clock; tough to say which was the bigger factor in the game ending up as close as it was. Aside from that however, their defense was very ordinary for most of the game, quite a lot of standing back and giving the Clippers plenty of room to do what they wanted.

The Lakers won't change their coach now that means Gasol's role won't change and he will continue to suck under this system. Just trade him already for a more athletic/shooters role players that they can use off the bench.

Lakers bench right now, Hill (good), Meeks (streaky), Morris ( ) and Jamison who is frustrated on his role too.

I believe there will be a major change soon, they are Lakers and that's that.

I dont really understand why a coach comes in and refuses to play the kind of game he has the players for. Does this make sense? Did the best coaches in history use their roster the right way or force it into their system? (this is not a retorical question. Maybe some of you have an answer for me)

Jackal wrote:Who wasn't being embarassed by Griffin? Even Howard got dunked on so that's a bullshit reason, with that logic even he should've been benched.

Dito that. Everybody's still thinking about those two big posters by Griffin over Gasol last year whilst at least one of these was a clear charge. Griffin goes all-in with his dunks, but never gets called for a charge because it's spectacular. That makes it very tough to defend. Apart from that I'd rather get dunked on by BG than shoot a brick against the side of the backboard.

The fact remains that Griffin was easily getting past gasol on the wing and beating him down the court on transition. This is just more evidence that gasol is better suited to play center at this stage of his career.

Well I aint no Lakers fan, so there is no reason to cry for me. Youre statin the obvious with Gasol since he has gotten a step slower and was never a good one on one defender. That does not mean he should play C so, but rather he should guard the weaker of the two opponent big men. (In this case Jordan, who might be athletic but does not have the footwork to go past Gasol).